January 10, 2010

POWER TO THE PEOPLE

Welcome to the new decade, all you shivering Kansans. How do you like Al Gore's "global warming" so far? You do remember the former senator, failed presidential candidate and inventor of the Internet, don't you?

He's the one who presented us with the "inconvenient truth" that man's actions are blanketing the earth with aerial pollutants that are rapidly melting the polar ice caps, murdering the polar bears, drowning little island nations and driving untold millions of deprived Third World residents into early graves for lack of sustainable natural resources.

I read recently that his sprawling Tennessee mansion consumes as much as 20 times the energy used by the average single-family home. I don't personally know. Al hasn't invited me to visit. But I believe that claim is as valid as the claims he made in his mockumentary, which you'll recall received the 2007 Nobel Peace Prize.

The "global warming" craze amounts to a nugget of truth wrapped in a mountain of misinformation - a fact the scientists manipulating the data concede among themselves.

The evidence of nature tells us Earth's temperature fluctuates through several degrees as part of a recurring cycle that began long before human life appeared, and surely will continue long after it disappears. Even our own government scientists report that, for the last 11 years or so, the climate has been cooling, not warming.

Over the past year, anecdotal evidence for a cooling planet has exploded. China has its coldest winter in 100 years. Baghdad sees its first snow in recorded history. North America has the most snow cover in 50 years. Record levels of Antarctic sea ice, record cold in Minnesota, Texas, Florida, Mexico, Australia, Iran - the list goes on and on.

But Gore would have us believe we live too well; that if we don't mend our ways posthaste, cease our profligate use of energy, scrap our SUVs, share much of our wealth and return to a sandal-and-stewpot culture, we'll doom humankind in another generation or so.

Isn't it curious that those shouting "Amen!" the loudest are those who would be at the head of the line to divvy up our goodies. And those most reluctant to join the chorus are those who, like the Chinese, are busily earning a share for themselves.